Congratulations on 1 Year of Browser Development!

Hey Team Vivaldi, I'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate you guys on exactly [b]one year of browser development[/b]. As you know, the first public release, Technical Preview 1, was released on this very same date, one year ago. Vivaldi Browser has certainly come a long way since then, and it's getting better with each and every new snapshot release. Please, stay the course, you guys and girls, because what would we do without such a wonderful browser to enhance our online experience?! I thank you loads for your vision, your willingness to consider the needs and wishes of your user base, and also your tenacity. Looking forward to the [b]first final version of Vivaldi Browser[/b]. Thanks. :cheer:

I've been giving out many bug reports each day, sometimes up to 5-7 a day, sometimes more. I'm paying a lot of attention to small details in design/function of things, whether there's something wrong, or something to be improved or put there. I haven't felt this much passion for a product in a while, and I love using the browser.

I'm just hoping the final release can come soon. It's ETA is spring, and spring starts at the end of March, so hopefully then we get the final. After that, I can't wait for sync and mobile to come. Those are the main things I can't wait for.

I'm hoping the browser gets polished, and I've been doing my part on helping with that. I also hope it'll be more efficient on RAM, CPU spike is handled, and it's UI performance/smoothness gets sorted out, then it'll be the best browser ever.

Then, hopefully, by version 2.0 they've fully caught up on everything they've done in O12 in terms of all the features, and they'll go on to add new features they haven't done, such as reader mode, and others that other browsers have that Vivaldi/O12 didn't. And that it'll have nice font rendering just like O12 had.

Edit: By the way, any more features needed or expected before the final release?

I'd like to take this opportunity to congratulate you guys on exactly one year of browser development. As you know, the first public release, Technical Preview 1, was released on this very same date, one year ago. Vivaldi Browser has certainly come a long way since then, and it's getting better with each and every new snapshot release.

Please, stay the course, you guys and girls, because what would we do without such a wonderful browser to enhance our online experience?! I thank you loads for your vision, your willingness to consider the needs and wishes of your user base, and also your tenacity.

Looking forward to the first final version of Vivaldi Browser.

Thanks. :cheer:

Vivaldi_TP_1.0.83.38.exe was released 1/27/2015. I downloaded and installed it the next day. So, Happy 1 year and 19 day Anniversary!! Woohoo!!

Well, that's an impressive amount of work you've mentioned there, and that reminds me to also congratulate all of us users who have contributed so hard to the ongoing success and development of this unique browser. So, congrats to all of us then!

I agree with you on all points regarding the way you hope the browser is going to come together and evolve.

Oh, and that edited-in question at the bottom of your post, was that directed at me or at the team? If at me, then, yes, I'd like a couple of features and options to be added before final comes, but none are really urgently needed, I guess.

Vivaldi Tech preview 1 just arrived
Written by Vivaldi Team
February 16, 2015

Friends,

After a lot of hard work, it's finally time for us to share what we have worked on with all of you! Today at 10:00 CET, we've made the first preview of Vivaldi browser available for download!

As this is the first public release, the build is not perfect, far from it but we hope you get a sense of where Vivaldi is going as a product. Please download TP1 from www.vivaldi.com and give it try. Let us know what you think and help us spread the words through social media to your friends.

Your feedback is critical to shape Vivaldi to get to where we want it to be. We hope together with all of you, we make this a great browser!

We love to hear from you.

Best,

Vivaldi Team

Last modified on Monday, 16 February 2015 18:40

But, anyway, if indeed the date you mentioned is the true date on which TP1 was released, then I thank you for correcting me.

If you take a look at these search results I think you will see that I'm being accurate:Jan 27 Articles

Also, if you still have a copy of the original TP on your HDD you will note that it is dated 01/27/2015.

On the 28th, while perusing the Opera Developer blog, I noted a comment from a user concerning how the new Vivaldi browser had been started by Jon and would have email built in, and I said "Hey? Who? Wha-?" and went immediately to the site and downloaded it. The rest is history, as they say…

I think what happened is, that they did indeed release TP1 on the 27th of January and announced it on their blog at the same time, but then edited that blog post on Feb 16 which led to it carrying that date as its publishing date. I've seen this happen before on the blogs, so this might very well be what happened in this particular case, as well.

I don't have the original installation file though, because I only learned of Vivaldi's existence two months after its first release date of Jan 27, 2015, and at that time it couldn't be downloaded no more. But, no worries, I believe ya, my friend.

**Oh, and that edited-in question at the bottom of your post, was that directed at me or at the team? If at me, then, yes, I'd like a couple of features and options to be added before final comes, but none are really urgently needed, I guess.

Keep up the good work!**

I mostly mean anyone who would know the answer, whether it's you, any user, soprano, or any Vivaldi team member who may know the answer to the question of "are there going to be any more features coming up before the final?". I'm not sure there are other than putting in some more tab behavior options, which is needed, and other little things that are definitely needed.

Other than that, there is still quite a bit of polishing and bug fixing needed to be done. I've been giving suggestions for many polishing things. For example, I started giving suggestions the last few weeks to finally have the alt key disabled for mouse gestures, and others had also started mentioning it as well, but they finally put it as an option, and it was turned off by default. It was a little irritating, and I'm so glad I can browse the web without irritation like that.

Another thing I've gotten an acknowledgment on just the other day was the fact that the mouse cursor doesn't disappear in a fullscreen video, which is really irritating, and Opera 35 doesn't do that. So, I've been waiting for the next snapshot this week very anxiously, because I can't wait to have that fixed and start enjoying videos better.

A bunch of other little stuff like some UI stuff I've mentioned that got heard, and would be very nice if some of that stuff could be tweaked before the final. I think by polish is meant how it looks, as well as how it functions. So while they need to improve on the performance and smoothness of the UI, it's also the aesthetics that I've been suggesting some cool stuff I'd like to see in it. Mostly little things, but also some things I think would just give it a more complete look.

Other than the polishing and the performance/UI they need to do, they also need the make it more RAM efficient, to the point where it's as efficient as other browsers at least. But I find that if you run the portable app Wise Memory Optimizer while you have Vivaldi open, you'll notice the RAM usage goes WAY down for VIvaldi, which helps a lot.

After that, it's mostly a matter of bug fixing, and making Vivaldi stable. It's pretty stable if I don't download any extensions, but it only crashes about 1-2 times a day for me, but I would like even that to be brought down to no crashes.

Of course, they were working on it for some time prior to that … only Jon would really know. He's said he looked at new Opera and didn't like it, but that could have been any time from July 2013 (release date on 15 stable). I was asked to help test the early versions in November of 2014, no idea how long they were working on it before that.

Right, well, given that you're so involved in the browser's development, even though it's not in a professional manner, I can understand your need for certain aspects of it to be addressed as soon as possible. I think it has to do with one's level of enthusiasm for something, and I'm under the impression that yours is pretty high, which I certainly applaud.

So, yes, I agree that there are quite a number of things that would preferably be included/taken care of before the first final arrives. Because, even though, right now, my involvement is somewhat less than yours is, I'm also really enthusiastic about this great browser. I therefore have up-voted most of your comments on the blogs thus far, and will of course continue to do so, as I normally do with anyone's comments that I agree with, especially when they contain good suggestions for features, options, alterations, improvements, and so on.

As for memory usage, yes, there's certainly room for improvement in that area, as is also the case with CPU usage, and, you're quite right, UI performance and smoothness. All important things that are in need of some serious love and attention from the devs, I must admit.

That's an interesting product range that they've got on that WiseClean website, btw. Thanks for that suggestion, I'll take a closer look at it, soon.

Finally, you mention Vivaldi crashing on you a couple times a day, but, that is something that has so far rarely happened to me with any of the builds I installed, even though I've got nearly 30 extensions running (some just for testing) and have sometimes more than 40 tabs open at once, including some with video. But, i guess determining the cause for those crashes also involves taking into account one's setup, as well as the way one uses their system and the browser, of course. So, I find that that remains a bit of a hard thing to figure out, most of the time.

Of course, they were working on it for some time prior to that … only Jon would really know. He's said he looked at new Opera and didn't like it, but that could have been any time from July 2013 (release date on 15 stable). I was asked to help test the early versions in November of 2014, no idea how long they were working on it before that.

Sure thing, I realized this already when I was composing my opening post, but thought it a bit silly to name it "Congratulations on 1 Year of Browser Releases," and so I opted for the word "development" instead. But I do acknowledge the fact that they'd started development way before the end of January, 2015, already. Maybe someone ought to ask Jon about the exact date on his upcoming Twitter Q&A, this Thursday…

Thanks for the warm message! And I like it when there are more people like you commenting regularly. Sometimes I look at the forums for a new interesting thread or comment, and just wish it was more exciting. Maybe once we have 30 million users instead of 3 million, then we'll see more action in the forums!

And for the crashes, they used to happen a lot. I have MacType installed because I wont better font rendering(Opera 12 with MacType is amazing), and I used to have some extensions in Vivaldi like Font Rendering Enhancer to further improve it(with Directwrite disabled), and uBlock Origin, but disabled that once I get Web Boost extension, plus H264ify. Vivaldi was freezing on me many times a day, like 5-7 times a day, so I uninstalled it and reinstalled it. That fixed a lot of problems for me, and it only freezes 1-2 times a day(sorry, I meant freeze instead of crash), and I have no extensions installed and no vivaldi:flags settings activated.

I'm wondering what I should do, because a few months ago, I tried reinstalling Windows 10 by USB key, and ever since I do that, the HP logo on my computer has always gone through a different routine than before. The loading circle used to animate normally, and now it still does, for like a few seconds, but then it flashes and the circle loading animation starts lagging for a few seconds, and then it finally boots up, but slower than it did before the last reinstall.

So now I'm wondering if I should reinstall Windows 10. I installed a new copy on a USB, and I figure I should probably do it before June or July, whenever they expire their free Windows 10 upgrade deal.

Thanks for the warm message! And I like it when there are more people like you commenting regularly. Sometimes I look at the forums for a new interesting thread or comment, and just wish it was more exciting. Maybe once we have 30 million users instead of 3 million, then we'll see more action in the forums!

Why thank you!

Yes, a tenfold increase in users is likely to have that effect, I'm sure, aside from various other effects, as well, but that's beside the point.

And for the crashes, they used to happen a lot. I have MacType installed because I wont better font rendering(Opera 12 with MacType is amazing), and I used to have some extensions in Vivaldi like Font Rendering Enhancer to further improve it(with Directwrite disabled), and uBlock Origin, but disabled that once I get Web Boost extension, plus H264ify. Vivaldi was freezing on me many times a day, like 5-7 times a day, so I uninstalled it and reinstalled it. That fixed a lot of problems for me, and it only freezes 1-2 times a day(sorry, I meant freeze instead of crash), and I have no extensions installed and no vivaldi:flags settings activated.

First, thank you for mentioning those extensions, there, because some of those I hadn't heard of before and now that I've tried them out, I'm really rather pleased with them. So, thanks again.

A couple of freezes a day might not be all that uncommon, depending on how much time you spend using the browser and how much you stress it. Because, even though crashes, like I said before, have been rare so far, freezes on the other hand occur quite often, but that doesn't worry me all that much while the browser's still in beta stage. So, it's a little hard to tell whether or not you're actually dealing with a problem that needs sorting, or that it's really to be expected in relation to the way you test and use Vivaldi on a daily basis.

I'm wondering what I should do, because a few months ago, I tried reinstalling Windows 10 by USB key, and ever since I do that, the HP logo on my computer has always gone through a different routine than before. The loading circle used to animate normally, and now it still does, for like a few seconds, but then it flashes and the circle loading animation starts lagging for a few seconds, and then it finally boots up, but slower than it did before the last reinstall.

So now I'm wondering if I should reinstall Windows 10. I installed a new copy on a USB, and I figure I should probably do it before June or July, whenever they expire their free Windows 10 upgrade deal.

Reinstalling it once again couldn't hurt, I guess. Give it a try and see what changes regarding your boot-up sequence. The lagging might indicate that the OS is looking for one or more drivers, which it can't find or fails to load…

As for Windows 10, well, I never managed to get very excited about any Windows version after 7, so, good luck with that...

Sure, but those are two properties that I find don't make up for several others that I'm not so thrilled about, like, for instance, many of its design features, its privacy issues, and the fact that Win10 is really pushing you hard toward creating a Microsoft account. So, there's that, too.

Yeah. I turned off all of the privacy-invading and Microsoft account crap, including Cortana and all of that. I log in with a local profile, and I put Classic Shell on it. So were it not for the improved performance, you'd never know I left Win7.

Edit: By the way, any more features needed or expected before the final release?

I feel a bit frustrated by the lack of improvement in important areas like Mouse Gestures. A few more basic commands like GestureDown to go the bottom of a page, and GestureUp to go to the top would help, but ideally, of course, we want to be able to customise Mouse Gestures, concatenating commands as we can in Opera 12.17

I have no need of a mobile version or synch, and think these should wait a little longer until Vivaldi is a bit more mature and stable. Like the email client, though important to many users, these could do serious damage to Vivaldi's reputation if they are released prematurely in the final version, and lose user's data. I am sure old users remember the many threads we had on My Opera about lost data due to synch being confusing for users. It might just be feasible to thoroughly test the mail client so that it's safe to release by the end of March, but from what I hear it doesn't seem to be ready for release even in Snapshots yet.

I have been using Opera since ver 5.0 and one tends to forget how slow the development process was. I think it took about 11-12 years to get from ver 5 to ver 12. I am still happy to use Opera 12.17 for my email and daily browsing. It's easy to open a tab in Vivaldi or Firefox if a site is broken in old Opera.

Yeah. I turned off all of the privacy-invading and Microsoft account crap, including Cortana and all of that. I log in with a local profile, and I put Classic Shell on it. So were it not for the improved performance, you'd never know I left Win7.

Or you do that, of course. I mean, yeah, I can see how taking all those measures could reduce many of my biggest objections to upgrading to Win10, but, I'm not so sure yet. So, for now, I'll just stick with Win7 and, who knows, maybe one of these days I'll wake up feeling adventurous and slap the stuff onto my box, anyway. :lol:

On the 28th, while perusing the Opera Developer blog, I noted a comment from a user concerning how the new Vivaldi browser had been started by Jon and would have email built in, and I said "Hey? Who? Wha-?" and went immediately to the site and downloaded it. The rest is history, as they say…

Indeed. Not that he needs it, but just saying fyi – i backup Ayespy here. I read the same Opera post, had the same reaction, took the same action, fell in love with it [LOTS of giggling & delighted whooping ensued at my pc that day]. Primary difference was that i was a comparative latecomer… my V-day was not until 7 Feb 2015.